On May 22, Rockne Newell talks about his dispute with Ross Township over junk on his property. / Keith R. Stevenson, Pocono Record, via AP

by Doug Stanglin, USA TODAY

by Doug Stanglin, USA TODAY

A 59-year-old man who has been feuding with local officials for 18 years over his junkyard property was arraigned on homicide charges Tuesday for allegedly opening fire at a township meeting in far eastern Pennsylvania and killing three people.

Rockne Newell was charged with three counts of homicide and two counts of attempted homicide.

Monroe County Coroner Bob Allen said Newell was about to shoot six more people when two people wrestled him to the ground during the meeting Monday evening in Saylorsburg, in far eastern Pennsylvania.

Police said at a Tuesday news conference that Newell first fired off 23 rounds from a Ruger Mini-15 rifle then went back to his rented Chevy Impala and retrieved a .44 Magnum handgun that he used in a second barrage.

Police told reporters that he was not wearing body armor and said that he did not expect to survive the shooting, the Pocono Record reported.

State police said as many as 18 people were attending the Ross Township meeting at the time.

The dead were identified as Chestnuthill Township Supervisor David Fleetwood and residents Gerard Kozic, 53, and James LaGuardia, 64, both of Saylorsburg.

The Pocono Record said Township Manager Dave Albright choked back tears Tuesday as he described Supervisor Fleetwood as a man who would "give you the shirt off his back. He'd do anything for you."

At Tuesday's arraignment, a judge asked Newell if he owned any real estate and he responded: "They stole it from me. That's what started all this."

Investigators said Newell, wearing a blue Hawaiian shirt and sporting stringy hair and a long gray beard, fired as he approached the municipal building around 7:30 p.m. and continued as he walked into and through it. He then went back out to his vehicle in the parking lot, retrieved a handgun and went back into the building, firing more shots, police said.

Two people died at the scene, and a third died after being flown to a hospital.

Three people, including the shooter, were injured in the melee. Two were treated and released from a local hospital, the Record reported Tuesday. Newell, who was shot in the leg by his own weapon, was carried from the scene on a stretcher.

A fourth person, a woman, was undergoing surgery late Monday. Her injuries were not disclosed.

Pocono Record reporter Chris Reber, who was covering the meeting in Saylorsburg, Pa., wrote in a first-person account that he heard more than 10 shots "like a string of firecrackers."

The reporter, attending his first township meeting, described plaster blown through the walls by the gun's blast.

The gunman was eventually tackled by one of the men attending the meeting in the township.

"(West End Open Space Commission executive director) Bernie Kozen bear-hugged the gunman and took him down," Reber said. "He shot the shooter with his own gun."

In June, the Record wrote about an 18-year fight between the township, with a population of around 5,500 people, and Newell over his ramshackle property, which includes an old camper in the front yard filled with wooden pallets, pieces of what appear to be old railroad ties and trash.

In August 2012, a Monroe County court sided with the township and ordered Newell to vacate the premises until he had obtained proper permits.The report said Newell had been living out of a 1984 Pontiac Fiero and in abandoned buildings since being ordered to leave the premises.

Newell told the paper he was unemployed for years after an injury from a crash and had nowhere else to go.

"They have no right to kick me off my property," he told the Record. "They call my property an eyesore. When I bought it, it was one of only three properties on the entire road that didn't have what they call junk."

Last October, Newell set up a fundraising page online -- saveRockyshome -- and was trying to raise $10,000 to pay for legal fees in his battle with the township.

His appeal:

I need to clean up & I need a lawyer,I have no place to go and my 2 rescue dogs will be put to sleep because no one else will take themRoss township took me to court & the court ruled that I have to vacate my home of 20 years & remove the bridge that FEMA gave me $5000 to put in as well as clean up my land I live on SSI which comes to $600 a month I have no money to clean up & it is insane to make me remove a bridge that FEMA gave the money to put in! I have no place to go I need a Lawyer but have no money!